MESSAGES FROM NOWHERE

Anonymous remail protects the sender’s identity against potential eavesdroppers. The Mixmaster protocol gives users a mature technology for anonymous remail, and the text-based Mixmaster client is an example of a free remailer application.

When Johan Helsingius started up an anonymization service for email back in 1993, he could hardly have anticipated the kind of trouble he would be in for. Despite, or maybe because of, the hostile reactions, Johan is now renowned for his pioneering work. In the early 90s, mailing lists and USENET discussion groups had left the phase in which they mainly concentrated on scientific and computer-related subjects. USENET also supported a number of highly controversial political and religious discussions. Because these discussions were of interest to secret services and employers, users were looking for a way of expressing themselves anonymously. Johan Helsingius developed software for depersonalizing email messages and installed the software on his server.